Impact of agriculture on climate change

Figure 2: 1.7 | Total anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (gigatonne of CO2- equivalent per year, GtCO2-eq/yr) from economic sectors in 2010. The circle shows the shares of direct GHG emissions (in % of total anthropogenic GHG emissions) from five economic sectors in 2010. The pull-out shows how shares of indirect CO2 emissions (in % of total anthropogenic GHG emissions) from electricity and heat production are attributed to sectors of final energy use. ‘Other energy’ refers to all GHG emission sources in the energy sector as defined in WGIII Annex II, other than electricity and heat production {WGIII Annex II.9.1}. The emission data on agriculture, forestry and other land use (AFOLU) includes land-based CO2 emissions from forest fires, peat fires and peat decay that approximate to net CO2 flux from the sub-sectors of forestry and other land use (FOLU) as described in Chapter 11 of the WGIII report. Emissions are converted into CO2-equivalents based on 100-year Global Warming Potential (GWP100), taken from the IPCC Second Assessment Report (SAR). Sector definitions are provided in WGIII Annex II.9. {WGIII Figure SPM.2}
Besides its contribution to global warming, farming has other detrimental effects on the environment. Agriculture is often the reason for deforestation and a change in land use, from natural ecosystems that take up and store carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere, to farmland. These activities cannot be viewed independently.Greenhouse gases (GHGs) have different sources within agriculture. The livestock sector alone is responsible for about 44% of human-induced methane (CH4) emissions, 53% nitrous oxide (N2O) and 5% carbon dioxide (CO2). Methane has two main sources:- the digestive processes in cattle and similar fermentative processes in manure
- rice paddies; where constant flooding of the fields creates similar, anaerobic conditions which favour methane production.

Figure 3: 11.2 | AFOLU emissions for the last four decades. For the agricultural sub-sectors emissions are shown for separate categories, based on FAOSTAT, (2013). Emissions from crop residues, manure applied to soils, manure left on pasture, cultivated organic soils, and synthetic fertilizers are typically aggregated to the category ‘agricultural soils’ for IPCC reporting. For the Forestry and Other Land Use (FOLU) sub-sector data are from the Houghton bookkeeping model results (Houghton et al., 2012). Emissions from drained peat and peat fires are, for the 1970s and the 1980s, from JRC/PBL (2013), derived from Hooijer et al. (2010) and van der Werf et al. (2006) and for the 1990s and the 2000s, from FAOSTAT, 2013.
References and further reading:
- Gerber, P.J., Steinfeld, H., Henderson, B., Mottet, A., Opio, C., Dijkman, J., Falcucci, A. & Tempio, G. (2013). Tackling climate change through livestock – A global assessment of emissions and mitigation opportunities. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Rome.
- Smith P., M. Bustamante, H. Ahammad, H. Clark, H. Dong, E. A. Elsiddig, H. Haberl, R. Harper, J. House, M. Jafari, O. Masera, C. Mbow, N.H. Ravindranath, C.W. Rice, C. Robledo Abad, A. Romanovskaya, F. Sperling, & Tubiello, F. (2014). Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use (AFOLU). Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change. Contribution of Working Group III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC
- Tubiello, F.N., Salvatore, M., Cóndor, G.R.D., Ferrara, A., Rossi, S., Biancalani, R., Federici, S., Jacobs, H. & Lammini, A. (2014). Agriculture, Forestry and other Land use Emissions by Sources and Removals by Sinks: 1990-2011 Analysis. ESS Working Paper No. 2. FAO, Rome, Italy
The Future of Farming: Exploring Climate Smart Agriculture

Our purpose is to transform access to education.
We offer a diverse selection of courses from leading universities and cultural institutions from around the world. These are delivered one step at a time, and are accessible on mobile, tablet and desktop, so you can fit learning around your life.
We believe learning should be an enjoyable, social experience, so our courses offer the opportunity to discuss what you’re learning with others as you go, helping you make fresh discoveries and form new ideas.
You can unlock new opportunities with unlimited access to hundreds of online short courses for a year by subscribing to our Unlimited package. Build your knowledge with top universities and organisations.
Learn more about how FutureLearn is transforming access to education